


The Desert Prince

by maxxrose



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Mortal Instruments (Movies), The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types, The Shadowhunter Chronicles - Cassandra Clare
Genre: Alec Lightwood Can't Cook, Alec Lightwood Loves Magnus Bane, Alec gets his mind blown, Alec just wants to chill, Alternate Universe - Shapeshifters, Angst, BAMF Magnus Bane, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Hurt Alec Lightwood, Hurt Magnus Bane, M/M, Magic, Magic Revealed, Magnus Bane Is Quite Magical, Magnus Bane is a Little Shit, Protective Alec Lightwood, Royals, Slow Burn, Stranded, Strangers to Lovers, Supportive Magnus Bane, THE LITTLE PRINCE AU, fairy tale AU, vice versa, world building
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-22 13:36:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22317118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maxxrose/pseuds/maxxrose
Summary: Alec Lightwood didn't see it coming when the controls suddenly failed, and he was forced to crash-land his plane in the Sahara Desert within an inch of his life. He was certain what awaited him was a long, agonizing death in the sand and smoldering heat.He expected death—most probably from dehydration, but Alec had salvaged one bottle of precious water and some food from his plane, and was determined to reach a small city he had seen when plummeting to the ground, before the freezing night temperatures set in.But what he didn't expect, was the young man flecked with starry dust and glowing golden eyes who came to him in the setting dusk, bathing in the red sun,  and who asked, in a soft voice that sent shivers up Alec's spine:"Please, will you draw me a sheep?"
Relationships: Alec Lightwood & Isabelle Lightwood, Alec Lightwood & Isabelle Lightwood & Jace Wayland, Alec Lightwood & Jace Wayland, Clary Fray/Jace Wayland, Isabelle Lightwood/Meliorn, Magnus Bane & Alec Lightwood, Magnus Bane & Raphael Santiago, Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood
Comments: 4
Kudos: 34





	The Desert Prince

Alec struggled not to panic. 

_Breathe, breathe, breathe,_ he could hear Isabelle saying in his ear, but that was easy for _her_ to say, because obviously she wasn't in Alec's position: about to die in a failing plane. 

He swallowed back the rising sob climbing up his raw throat, forcing the fear and blind panic from his mind to focus on the blinking controls in front of his face. The alarms were all going off, their magnetic pulses thrown off by some mysterious occurrence—Alec didn't know what to do with half of the emergency buttons that popped up on the screens. Alec propelled himself forward, the straps to his chest tightening, to extend the flaps on the plane in order to slow down his descent. The wind was whipping at the glass panes as the plane groaned, the nose tilting downwards.

 _Fuck,_ Alec swore in his head, sending a Mayday call through the plane's transmitters. He typed in his geographical location with shaking fingers, and issuing a cause of engine failure to identify the plane's problem. The radar glowing on the screen whirled, and Alec realized with a jolt of terror that there were no planes around. At all. Not even in a 5,000 mile radius. It was the Sahara Desert, for fuck's sake, and he knew even one a busy day not many planes made the journey across. 

He checked the monitors—the engines were working relatively fine, except for the right turbine, that was encountering a glitch. What the hell was happening? The plane could still operate on one engine, but that didn't seem to be the case, because the plane suddenly slid to the side in midair and Alec gasped out a panicked yell as his body collided with the window, the straps yanking him back in time before his head crashed into it. 

Alec tensed as the screen blasted red bright words, _Approaching 3000 feet above ground. Uncontrolled Descent._ Alec almost rolled his eyes at the clarity of the message, because planes always had to be 500 feet above ground at all times. It was really hard to care about all the houses and trees that could be damaged, though, when Alec was pretty sure he was going to die. 

He couldn't even say goodbye to Isabelle and Jace.

Isabelle's beautiful face flashed into his mind, followed by his brother, and then all the people Alec loved. 

The thought led his eyes to well, and Alec blinked away the burning tears, drawing in a ragged breath. He still had time to attempt to control the crash, by at least directing it towards a flat, open terrain where he had more chance of survival. 

He had to try, even if he had a slim chance of staying alive, he had to try. 

Alec wasn't ready to die yet. 

So he clicked the switches to propel the plane's flaps upwards, and the nose of the plane dipped dangerously for a moment, but then began to levitate upwards. The little trinkets he had in the plane slammed to the ceiling, and Alec flinched, his chest tight with terror. He was so scared. Flashes of a grisly death, his last sight would be roaring infernos. _God, I don't want that,_ and Alec shook his head, sweat dripping off his nose as he veered the steering stick back, trying to stabilize the plane. 

His best shot at landing safely, Alec knew with an impending sense of dread as he stared out the foggy windows and saw nothing but endless sand dunes, was if he managed to pull the plane into a glide. 

_Approaching 1500 feet, Uncontrolled Descent,_ the plane helpfully blared at him, alarms wailing in the cramped chamber. Alec squeezed his eyes shut, his heart beating frantically against his ribs so fast they _hurt._

The plane _shuddered,_ as it plunged through the air, and Alec glanced wildly around the cabin as the metal around him creaked, like the plane itself was giving up. He reached frantically around the back of the seat to grab the emergency parachute, which was his last-ditch effort. Alec groaned at the pain shooting up his arms as he twisted around to unlatch the clips, and pulled at the packet to get it free.

And pulled. 

"No," Alec whispered, because the jacket was _stuck._ Some part of the plastic was wrapped around the metal lodged from the seat, and it wasn't budging. If the metal had pierced the plastic, that meant the parachute was probably damaged. And even if he could rip the parachute out, there would be no guarantee the fabric hadn't been shredded. With a rising wave of despair, Alec threw himself back against the seat, hands in his hair, and let the tears he had been holding back track down his cheeks. 

_500 feet to ground,_ the monitors screamed, and Alec took a scrunched fist and slammed it onto the armrest, fury blazing in his veins, vibrating in his skin, roaring in his ears. He wasn't supposed to die like this. Not on a trip across the Sahara. 

Alec stared numbly at the controls, as the cursors swung side to side so rapidly the glass trembled like it was going to crack. His breath stuck in his throat, as he glanced outside the smoggy windshield and saw the ground, the reality of it sunk in. He was going to crash. It was a fucking nightmare, and Alec couldn't escape it. 

Then a little glint of something white caught his eye, and Alec squinted his eyes, pressing his hands to the armrests so hard the knuckles bled white. It was a town—small, tiny iridescent buildings with opaque domes, in the far, far, distance—but a town no less. _Civilization._

Alec nearly screamed in relief, because if he managed to survive the crash, all he had to do was muster the energy and courage to find that town, and then the rest would be fine from there. With a renewed surge of hope, Alec desperately flailed at the yoke, and once his fingers got ahold of it, he grabbed it so tight the leather gathered under his thumb and he forced it fully back. He had to keep the nose wheel off the ground, for as long as possible. With one hand on the yoke, he rummaged quickly in the cabinet under the central monitors, and stuffed all the food he could find (dried beef jerky, biscuits, energy bars) and as his fingers closed around the plastic of a water bottle, Alec nearly crumpled in gratitude. He closed the zipper on the bag and leaned forward to slide his shoulders into the straps.

Summoning every ounce of strength in his body, Alec fixed his eyes on the incoming terrain, and he saw the terrible brightness of the sand dunes looming a couple hundred feet from his position in the cockpit. He had to keep the field in sight in order to try and control his landing, and he had no doubt he may not survive it. 

In a final move, as the plane barreled to the ground at 200 feet, Alec switched the flaps to extension to aim its point down on the wieldshield. It was all that was left to do, and that was it.

"Please," Alec sobbed into the air, praying to whatever Deity was in the sky (he never believed in religion) leaning his head backwards in defeat. There was nothing left to do, but wait. He still had his hand clenched tight around the yoke, the muscles in his arm straining as the yoke tremored, inching back. "Please let me live."

Then he opened his eyes, and the mountainous mounds of vibrant, golden sand was in front of him, and he felt the impact under his feet first, reverberating through his bones and Alec's mouth snapped open involuntarily, saliva dripping over his chin. The collision traveled over his bones to his skin, and the plane flopped belly first onto the ground and Alec was, in spite of the seatbelt, thrown to the ceiling and with a strangled howl of _anger_ and _fear_ Alec's skull crashed against the metal, blood flooding his mouth and then the world went black. 

He awoke the pungent stench of smoke first. 

Alec blinked his eyes open, and was overwhelmed by the wave of pain that shot through his entire body like a lightning bolt, lighting every of his nerves on fire and leaving him paralyzed and terrified. The dust in the air stung his eyes, and Alec fought to clear his vision, only to have all of his senses geared towards the suffocating _heat._

He survived.

He survived the crash. Alec wanted to cry. He wanted to scream. He wanted to just lay back, and be relieved, be _grateful_ he hadn't perished in the plane crash, but there was so much _pain_ gushing through his body he could barely think. Let alone breathe. It was leaking out of every orifice, pooling under his chest and it was getting harder and harder to remind himself to keep taking in deep breaths. He wasn't sure if that was due to the trails of smoke going in the air, or the dust, or the fucking _sand_ he felt scratching incessantly against his skin. 

Alec didn't have time to celebrate his survival, because if there was smoke, there was only one reason why. The engine was going to blow. Amidst the crackling of the metal singed against the sand, leaving an awful burning smell, Alec could hear the ominous trickle of fuel. If he survived, only to die in an explosion, that would be really fucking funny. 

So he forced his arms to move, and he managed to crawl out of the destroyed cockpit. The backpack of water and food was still attached, and Alec _knew_ it was his goddamn lucky day. The entire dashboard in front of him had disappeared, flown off several meters away. The windshield was cracked in two. The whole ceiling was caved in, and Alec's body was already halfway out the cockpit, which was probably what saved his head and neck from being squashed by the ceiling and that was why he could feel the sand. 

With every slight movement, his body screamed in protest. 

Alec turned his head to the side and spat out blood, and chips of fragmented teeth. 

The back of his hand, once reaching up to inspect it shakily, was wet with blood. Thick, tangy blood that steadily streamed down the back of his neck, but Alec was grateful he didn't at least feel the pain from the wound. Instead, all he felt was an aching numbness that went from his head to his torso. In a way, that was a blessing. 

Alec couldn't stop moving. Stopping meant death. He wasn't about to die. 

So he used his elbows and dragged his prone body forward, ignoring the agonizing blazes of pain that was concentrated mostly in his shoulder. As he moved painstakingly against the sand on his belly, he could feel the multiple lacerations and bruised flesh and bone already beginning to bloom. 

The remnants of the plane released another cloud of smoke, and Alec, in a bout of terror, pushed forward faster. He was almost at least ten meters away from the plane, which should be safe enough to prevent him from exploding to a thousand different bits of human flesh. It'd be a new kind of confetti for the Sahara Desert, Alec thought wryly as he rolled onto his back, grappling to catch his breath. 

He was prepared for the explosion, but no less petrified for it. 

As Alec turned slowly, what he saw left of the cockpit was engulfed in a violent burst of flames, the fire roaring fiercely and almost seven feet high. He scrambled back wildly, almost slipping through the fine sand as he stared, transfixed as the rest of the plane exploded. He felt the pressure and was knocked back against the sand, and Alec moaned as his back slammed against something hard. He reached behind, fingers trembling, and felt the cool plating of metal. A piece of the plane. 

Alec, ten meters from the wreckage, slowly let his head back down on the sand. He couldn't even open his eyes fully, because the sun was so bright, so, so bright, and it hurt to look. The sky, at least, was a beautiful, deep blue that he wasn't used to seeing in the crowded and polluted New York, so that was a change. 

He'd give up anything to be in his bed right now. Comfortable, _safe,_ not stranded in a desolate desert infamous for its endless dunes. 

He'd never felt so helpless. So weak. 

And because he couldn't stop himself, Alec let the tears fall.


End file.
